How to search for Classic Rewards tickets?

OK, availability is like water in Sahara, yet Qantas make special "treat" for their customers - if there is no seats then instead of showing calendar with empty spots QF website just kick you to some kind of empty error page and you have to start from the beginning. Moreover if I do much search activity on their website it simply kick me out and then I cannot login. So anyone know any hack how easy enough to see Classic Rewards availability?

Thanks.

Sorry, I also find it really hard to find a J seat without spending hours searching different dates and combinations. Hope their will be a wise one out their who can help….

I have never tried calling a Qantas agent, are they helpful in navigating the way to a classic reward?

It is frustrating and takes time.

I usually make searches in Private Browsing, so that when the error you notice kick in, I can simply close the window and start again.

You’re probably already aware, but the only way of seeing most of their availability is via the Multi-City Search, Selecting “Use Points”, checking the “Flexible with dates” box and backdating your travel so the calendar shows dates before and after.

Also start searching for the most critical sector first, later look at connecting flights for the rest. E.g. Sydney to London, search for Singapore or Haneda to London, as those flights are hard to come by in J, then search for the Sydney to Singapore or Haneda later, as these are easier to come by. Once you figured the dates build the entire fare in one go.

I find that Qantas is one of the most stingy OneWorld Carriers when it comes to Premium Cabins availability. So try searching for routes you know their partners (OneWorld or QFF Partners) operate, as they usually put more seats on offer.

If you quote here what your desired ports of departure and final arrival are, we can brainstorm possible allowed routes with other members.

No they are SO slow. Minimum 30-40 min calls.

Thanks a lot for king words and nice tips. But I doing all mentioned tips and tricks, so looking for new ones. FWIW from my experience JL currently is easiest carrier to get J, CX was very good and I really hope that they came back with high availability. QF is hard and QR is truly sux. BA is OK from time to time and EK became almost useless with their taxes while they use to be very good (though I am not and never been fun of them). I am REALLY flexible and was looking for flight to MXP (or around like CDG or ZRH) for two (yep, another complication) for the beginning of their summer, but now shift my planes to Sep - lets see what happens in coming months.

And I can add one more tip - buy whatever is available that you just OK with and try to change tickets later. For example I need to fly MEL-SIN. It is notoriously difficult to get a seat SIN-AUS, so I get one SIN-HKG-MEL. Later popped up flight SIN-SYD and I exchange my tickets. Also if you have enough points it is much hustle-free to but new ticket and cancel existing one than "change" in QF website. If you "change" you will ended up with 3-4 calls to them to finally settle the deal.

It's extremely frustrating. I finally got my RTW trip booked after months of searching and getting those errors. That the system just boots you out sucks & doesn't give any indication of where the error is. After each time, I would clear my cache & cookies, then start again. Trying different routes away from the most popular ones worked, Interestingly, at the time of searching, there were plenty of seats/airlines into the USA but could get nothing back to AUS. Plus you are now only given 6 sectors in the QF booking engine, which is very limiting. Previously I have been able to select 11 sectors. Trying the call centre was of no help either. I ended up having to make 2 bookings for reward redemption - outbound and then inbound. Thankfully I'm all good to go, but was a major hassle getting there!

What happened with CX? Back in 2019 I could find Sydney to London via HK in business for 159k points one way. Totally dried up.

It is becoming very clear that the partners Qantas has nowadays just arent cutting it, and actually VA is doing much better.

With QF releasing basically zero availability to and from europe, and their partners also not releasing much... time to move to VA!